{"id":45203,"date":"2013-06-12T00:18:48","date_gmt":"2013-06-12T07:18:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/?p=45203"},"modified":"2014-12-29T22:54:17","modified_gmt":"2014-12-30T05:54:17","slug":"two-headlines-from-the-land-that-has-lost-the-sense-of-the-common-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/markshea\/2013\/06\/two-headlines-from-the-land-that-has-lost-the-sense-of-the-common-good.html","title":{"rendered":"Two Headlines from the Land That Has Lost the Sense of the Common Good"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Democrats Love Gov\u2019t Surveillance \u2014 As Long As It\u2019s Obama, Not Bush\u2026<\/a>
\nBoehner: NSA Leaker a \u2018Traitor\u2019\u2026<\/a><\/p>\n

Both are from Drudge, who is dutifully attempting to use the NSA scandal as a way to attack Dems for Team Righty, while trying to ignore the fact that Team Righty wants the leaker dead since they are as supportive of the Obama Spy State as Obama is.<\/p>\n

The purpose of the State is *supposed* to be the defense of the common good.\u00a0 The reality is that American state, at any rate is devolving into a vast apparatus of surveillance and oppression of its citizens in the name of Safety.\u00a0 Between the two of them, Bush and Obama (and their parties) have created all the infrastructure any tyrant will ever need to turn the US into an Orwellian police state<\/a>:<\/p>\n

What we know is that the people in charge will possess the capacity to be tyrants \u2014 to use power oppressively and unjustly \u2014 to a degree that Americans in 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, or 2000 could\u2019ve scarcely imagined. To an increasing degree, we\u2019re counting on having angels in office and making ourselves vulnerable to devils. Bush and Obama have built infrastructure any devil would lust after. Behold the items on an aspiring tyrant\u2019s checklist that they\u2019ve provided their successors:<\/p>\n